RSPCA welcomes bill to prevent live export of ponies, donkeys and horses for slaughter

RSPCA Australia collects your personal information in order to achieve our animal welfare and related purposes. We may use it to provide you with information, services and products.

Without your information, we may not be able to provide you with the requested services or products, or with information about campaigns, activities, products and services that you may be interested in.

We may disclose your information to state and territory RSPCA organisations which are members of RSPCA Australia, and those organisations will use your information in accordance with their privacy policies. We will also disclose your information when legally required. In some cases we use third parties to manage our data collection and storage, some of who may store information overseas. Overseas recipients are located in the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

For more details see our Privacy Policy which includes information about how to access and correct your personal information, and also how to complain if you think we have breached your privacy.

The RSPCA has today welcomed the introduction of the Export Control Amendment (Equine Live Export for Slaughter Prohibition) Bill 2018 into the Senate by Senators Derryn Hinch and Lee Rhiannon.

The Bill seeks to prohibit the live export of equines for the purpose of overseas slaughter, and follows a successful Senate motion in June 2017.

The RSPCA said the Bill was becoming increasingly important as the demand from overseas interests, especially from China to obtain donkey skin, was rising – with wild and domestic donkey populations all over the world being decimated as a result.

The issue took on greater urgency when it was revealed in a 2017 Senate Estimates hearing that the Department of Agriculture was preparing regulatory changes to facilitate live export of equines such as ponies, horses, and donkeys.

The Bill will prohibit new live export markets from being created and stop Australian horses and donkeys – that have been taken from the wild, retired from the racing industry, or bought from their owners – from being sent on a dangerous and uncertain live export voyage, to be slaughtered in foreign countries under poor standards.

The Bill follows the tabling of a Senate petition in September of more than 21,000 concerned Australians that called on the Australian Government to expressly prohibit the live export of all equines for the purposes of slaughter, and to reject any initiatives that would facilitate the development of a live export trade in horses, ponies, or donkeys for slaughter.